Real politicking parallels comedy

Cambridge Times

I saw the movie The Campaign recently and loved it. For those who have not seen it, it is a comedy about the American election process and the dirty politicking that goes with it. Low brow humour to be sure, but then again, I also liked the movie Airplane. I know what you are thinking – surely this type of humour is beneath him. Well, it isn’t, and don’t call me Shirley.

The Cambridge Chamber of Commerce had a breakfast meeting last week and the guest speaker was Cambridge/North Dumfries MPP Dr. Rob Leone.

Dr. Rob gave us a recap of his last year in office and some of the agenda items that have taken up our provincial government’s time. These included the provincial Liberal government’s first defeat in nine years of power when Dr. Rob’s own bill requesting a timeline for hospital spending was passed. These hospital expenditures were the cornerstone of the Liberals’ last election campaign. Unfortunately, we still don’t have that timeline.

Yet another mismanagement of funds scandal was uncovered with the Ornge air ambulance debacle (just when we were starting to forget the eHealth boondoggle). This $150-million mess was vigorously debated in the legislature, but the money is still gone.

Most recently it has been the cancelled power plant fiasco. A campaign slight-of-hand that (at last count) is costing us $640 million that we don’t have. It was bad enough that the Liberals engaged in this criminal endeavour, but now they have crippled Ontario by proroguing government to avoid being held accountable.

Let’s take a quick look at how the next year is going to shape up. Dalton McGuinty has already indicated that the government will remain prorogued until a new leader for the Liberal party is found. This will occur at the Liberal leadership convention in February.

First thing the Liberals will have to do after they go back to work is table a budget. We can be pretty sure that whatever budget they table will be defeated and we’ll be back at the polls by May. That will be just in time for the newly elected government to adjourn for summer break. That means next September our legislative process will resume.

At this point, a line from the movie The Campaign comes to mind. The incumbent candidate says in his victory speech “I am a great politician, but I am a lousy congressman.”

Well Mr. McGuinty, I think this directly applies to you. You are a great politician, but a lousy premier. You have put the interests of your party before the interests of the Ontarians that elected you to power. You have displayed a wanton disregard for our trust and have at the very least condoned criminal behaviour by your party.

Your leadership ends in disgrace and the Liberal party will be voted back into the stone age in the next election. I can only hope that whoever comes into power next will not follow in your footsteps. Ontario cannot afford it.